Tips for the 10 minute treading portion of OW certification?

[JackD342]

I've always seen that it is making the "Ahhhhh" sound. Never heard of requiring a high pitched sound.This is so the instructor is sure you're airway is open. You can do the CESA without the sound as long as your airway is not closed off. When I practice it I still make the Ahhhh sound just to be absolutely sure my airway isn't even partially closed (if that's even possible).
I've seen and done 5 different ways to breathe from a free flow.

High pitched ahhh tends to use less air than a low pitched ahhh, in my experience.

 

[dmaziuk]

I know not to hold my breath but in general I mean it's hard for me to "not inhale" for 30 seconds, whether I'm holding it or blowing bubbles.

As my instructor put it, in a real CESA situation you will be very motivated not to inhale.

There is a number of issues with CESA training, so yeah, the whole exercise is a bit of a mess. The car thing is as good as anything you can do to practice it, but keep in mind that 40 seconds at 18 metres per minute is 12 metres. I.e. you can come up from 12m in that time -- but 12 msw is extra 1.2 atmospheres so if you were coming straight up from that depth you'd start with twice as much air in your lungs. Compared to what you got sitting in the car. On the other hand you're probably starting with your lungs full for practice (also for the test) whereas IRL you probably won't have that luxury. You'll probably have hard time keeping your ascent rate down to only 18 m/min -- that's really slow. And so on...

 

[JackD342]

I am done with the pool and classroom work.


I know not to hold my breath but in general I mean it's hard for me to "not inhale" for 30 seconds, whether I'm holding it or blowing bubbles. I feel I run out of air faster when I let a little air out of my mouth so maybe I need to work on that too.

And yes as someone mentioned, you do it in the OW but you have your regulator in so there's no chance or not making it.

I was also told that in the OW checkout dives for this skill, they expect you to make some kind of high pitched noise so they can hear that you aren't taking any air in and cheating. I tried that last night and it was very awkward and I was having trouble making a constant noise out of my mouth while simulating it.

Then on my drive home from work now I was trying it in my car and then realized how easy it is to make that high pitched noise when I have my mouth shut and am blowing the air out of my nose. I also find that easier to move air slower out of my nose in that fashion than out of my mouth. So perhaps I can just do that while I am doing the CESA skill? I made it like 40 seconds while testing this out in my car but again, I was just sitting down driving lol.

Oh and one more thing. I had seen videos of the free flow skill and I simply did not understand it. I didn't even really understand it when my instructor told me about it and was explaining it to me. But when I actually did it, wow, that is really weird lol.

Unless you use a mask with purge valve, I would be concerned about you trying this skill exhaling through your nose. You will be breaking the seal and flooding your mask to some degree, and probably make a stressful situation worse. That applies to both your Checkout Dives, and a real life situation if it came up.

 

[purbeast]

If you are done, and this is a PADI course, something may have been missed. Aside from the 30 second LP inflator hover, (formerly fin pivot) there is also a 60 second oral inflation hover. Unless you are doing Scuba Diver and not Open Water diver.

Yes it was a PADI course. I don't know, googling around I see some places say they specificly test above/below the surface, and some just say they test you on orally inflating it. So maybe my instructor assumes that since we could do it above surface after some strenuous activity, we'd be fine doing it underwater. We did the above water one pretty late in the training and we did it where we completely deflated our BCS and kicked for like 10 seconds to stay above water. Then we dropped our weight belt and kicked for like 10 seconds or so to stay above. Then we had to manually inflate it at the surface until we could float. I'm just assuming that doing that, plus all of the other skills, he was confident in us being able to inflate it underwater.

As my instructor put it, in a real CESA situation you will be very motivated not to inhale.

There is a number of issues with CESA training, so yeah, the whole exercise is a bit of a mess. The car thing is as good as anything you can do to practice it, but keep in mind that 40 seconds at 18 metres per minute is 12 metres. I.e. you can come up from 12m in that time -- but 12 msw is extra 1.2 atmospheres so if you were coming straight up from that depth you'd start with twice as much air in your lungs. Compared to what you got sitting in the car. On the other hand you're probably starting with your lungs full for practice (also for the test) whereas IRL you probably won't have that luxury. You'll probably have hard time keeping your ascent rate down to only 18 m/min -- that's really slow. And so on...

Yeah my instructor did mention that as well, that when coming up from even the 30 feet that I would have more air in my lungs than I did in the pool at like 3 feet, so that is something to think about as well to maybe help calm my nerves a little bit about it.

 

[dmaziuk]

Also keep in mind that urge to breathe is controlled by build-up of CO2, not by lack of O2. Freedivers use various meditation-type practices to control it and push their breath-holding times into double-digits... but even that car exercise should help if you keep doing it.

 

[purbeast]

Gotcha, that is interesting though I was not aware of that.

I also have to say that I think the thing I enjoyed learning most about SCUBA in general in the classroom portion of it was just in general about what exactly is happening to our bodies as we descend/ascend and the science behind it, and how it all just makes sense when put into scientific terms. And then the RDP tables was also very interesting to me and it clicked pretty early on for me in the class. Just all of the math and time involved to get all the nitrogen out of our bodies and stuff was just very interesting to me. Same with the depth/time relationship.

There were quite a few people who didn't really get it even by the final exam, but those questions were the funnest ones to me. Of course I'm a software engineer so I enjoy problem solving and math problems in general more than just memorizing stuff.

 

[tursiops]

Aside from the 30 second LP inflator hover, (formerly fin pivot) there is also a 60 second oral inflation hover.

The inflator hover does not have a time limit on it in the written standard; yes, there is a 60s oral inflation hover. From the Instructor Manual:
Dive 2. 10. Use low-pressure BCD inflation to become neutrally buoyant. Gently rise and fall in a controlled manner, during inhalation and exhalation.
Dive 4. 6. Orally inflate the BCD to hover for at least one minute, without kicking or sculling.

 

[JackD342]

The inflator hover does not have a time limit on it in the written standard; yes, there is a 60s oral inflation hover. From the Instructor Manual:
Dive 2. 10. Use low-pressure BCD inflation to become neutrally buoyant. Gently rise and fall in a controlled manner, during inhalation and exhalation.
Dive 4. 6. Orally inflate the BCD to hover for at least one minute, without kicking or sculling.

Agreed. I had a brain fart and blend two skills together. Dive 3 has the LP inflator 30 second hover. Once I realized,I figured the only way to correct myself before someone else did would be to pull the car over and get online. And it wasn’t THAT important to me...

 

[purbeast]

Does anyone have a link to the actual list/checklist that the instructors use while doing the dives? I thought it would be easy to find online so I didn't bother asking the one in my class, but doing a google search I'm not coming up with like real lists from PADI's website.

 

[tursiops]

Does anyone have a link to the actual list/checklist that the instructors use while doing the dives? I thought it would be easy to find online so I didn't bother asking the one in my class, but doing a google search I'm not coming up with like real lists from PADI's website.

There is no such link I am aware of.